The wind blew inside what looked like a long abandoned temple.
Pillars that once supported the roof lay scattered across the floor, their stone cracked and worn by centuries of neglect. Rusted sconces clung to the walls, barely holding together, their iron frames twisted and fragile, draped in thick webs that shimmered faintly in the dim light.
Dust coated the ground in uneven layers, broken only by the jagged remains of fallen stone and the faint trails of insects that had claimed the silence.
The windows, tall and narrow, rose like solemn guardians along the walls. They were shuttered, yet their design betrayed a Catholic influence, arched frames with a scale-like pattern etched into the glass. The panes were blackened and translucent, filtering the outside light into a muted glow that barely reached the center of the room. Each window seemed alive with shadow, allowing just enough illumination to reveal the decay without dispelling the gloom. The faint glow gave the impression of a place caught between light and darkness, as though the temple itself resisted being fully seen.
Ironically, instead of a worshiping altar at the far end, a throne rose from the shadows, vast, unyielding, and terrible in its perfection.
It stood untouched by dust, unmarked by webs, as though time itself had recoiled from its presence. The silence of the temple bent toward it, heavy and absolute, as if the very air feared to stir too close.
It was dark black in color, forged from a substance that mocked mortal craftsmanship, as if the hands that shaped it belonged to something beyond time itself.
Its surface shimmered with a scale-like pattern, yet gleamed too perfectly with a mirror polished surface that reflected the ruined hall in warped fragments.
But something didn't look right about it. The reflection was not honest, it was a twisted reality, bending the light into submission and swallowing it whole to amplify its beauty.
It towered nearly six feet, its breadth stretching close to three meters, vast enough to suggest dominion rather than rest. Its arms curved outward like skeletal remains, etched with serpents and skulls that seemed to whisper secrets of mortality.
The back rose high, tapering into jagged points that crowned it in silhouette, a dark coronation carved into stone and silence.
As the wind stirred again, the dust rose in a slow, mournful veil, drifting like a shroud across the floor and gently settled over something lying before the throne, no more than a meter away.
It was unmistakably the dead body of a young boy—no older than sixteen, his face pale and hollow, bore wounds long dried and the blood etched into his skin like cruel scars of memory.
His shirt hung in tatters, soaked and stiffened with stains of violence, exposing ribs and back marred by countless stab wounds.
His flesh carried burns that blackened and cracked, yet frozen shards of ice still pierced his skin, and jagged splinters of stone jutted from his body as if the elements themselves had conspired against him.
He was not simply dead, he was undone. Every mark upon him spoke of torment, of suffering so relentless that death itself seemed a mercy, a final kindness granted after agony had stripped him of everything else and yet, even in stillness, there was something unsettling and haunting about him.
The silence around him deepened, heavy with sorrow, as though the temple grieved in its own way. It was more like his presence was not just a tragedy, it was a question, unhealed wound that carved into the heart of the place.
He lay there like a forgotten offering before the throne, his suffering etched into the air, demanding pity from the eyes of long forgotten gods, at least to him, if they still do exist.
But suddenly, in that instance, the impossible happened.
"Uhhhhhhhhh…" The boy's bluish eyes suddenly snapped open, wide and trembling, as he drew in a ragged gasp of air.
It was not the breath of life, but the cry of someone who had glimpsed something far worse than death itself. His chest heaved, his body convulsed, and in that instant the silence of the temple shattered.
[System Notification: Temporary Resurrection Initiated]
[Designation: Successor Candidate Identified]
[You have been chosen as the Next Seater of the Throne of Chaos]
[Do you accept this fate?]
A dark black computerized screen with the crimson writings suddenly materialized in front of his eyes
The words pulsed, each line hammering into his mind with the weight of inevitability, but his thoughts were too fractured, too drowned in chaos to grasp them as memories surged like a flood, crashing against the walls of his consciousness and dragging him back into the life he had tried so hard to forget.
All those dead bodies scattered across the floor, some barely two years old. All those fire dancing on the roofs of the orphanage building, and those greamy smile on their faces, enjoying their achievements, made him to tighten the grip of his fist as a single drop of tears dropped down his face.
[Caution: If the candidate refuses the fate, the temporary Resurrection will be terminated]
[Count down will begin now.]
[10]
[9]
The notification displayed again but just like before, his mind just couldn't process the written words.
It was wrapped around the pain of imagining that he would never see those faces again. The faces of those he had grown up with, those that made the orphanage feel like home, all gone just like that, just because some superior bloodline of the Medley race wanted to have some little fun.
[8]
[7]
[6]
It started as a joke, but the one that lead to accidentally killing one of the orphans, and to hide the truth, they decided to claim the remaining innocent lives.
[5]
[4]
He barely managed to escape, but even then, they chased after him and what happened after, even his mind refused to remember.
[3]
[2]
It was fate far worse than death, and somehow, death was a salvation to him and he just couldn't be thankful enough. But just as he thought everything was over, the impossible happened.
"I'll kill them all." He found himself speaking between his teeth, but at that moment, the last piece of information displayed and pull him back to reality.
[1]
[0]
[Count down completed]
[The candidate did not accept the fate.]
[Temporary Resurrection Terminated]
The words displayed that snapped him back.
"I accepted!" He desperately screamed but by then, it was already too late as the system screen disappeared and forcing everything to return back to darkness and silence.